THE ARMY IN THE FAR EAST--1819-75
The minor wars outside the main peninsula of Hindostan have been caused
either by the expansion of the Empire of India in the only possible
direction--eastward--or for the purposes of colonisation or trade.
A series of points on the road to the Pacific were gradually obtained,
usually by purchase, between 1786 and 1824, such as Penang, and the
land opposite in the Straits of Malacca, with Singapore and Malacca
farther south. These guarded the sea-road to China, with whom we were
eventually to be engaged in war.
But before that happened, Alompra, King of Ava, had played into the
hands of those who were willing to add still more realms to those
already under the British flag. He had conquered much of the southern
peninsula, and, fancying himself irresistible, had raided our Cachar
territories which bordered on his. He had seized the island of Shapuree
and driven out the British guard there. Reluctant as was the East
India Company to engage in further war after the costly campaigns
with the Mahrattas, they had little choice. Prestige is all-important
with semi-barbaric nations, and force alone wins respect. So this
first expansion of empire into the Burma-Siamese peninsula began as a
punitive expedition.
It commenced with an outbreak of mutiny, which future events in India
rendered ominous. The 47th Bengal Regiment refused to embark for
Burmah, lest they should lose caste. It is possible that their scruples
were sincerely conscientious, and their contract of enlistment does not
seem to have contemplated their employment beyond the seas. It was bad
management to select those whose religious antagonism might be roused;
but the order had been given, and on the continued refusal of the men
to embark, they were fired on by European infantry and artillery and
massacred.
Then the expedition started, on a three years’ campaign, in which the
1st Royals, 13th, 38th, 41st, 44th, 47th, 54th, 87th, and 89th shared,
as did also the forerunner of the present 102nd or 1st Battalion Royal
Dublin Fusiliers, besides numerous regiments of Madras Sepoys.
There had been some skirmishing with the invaders of Cachar, in the
north-west, where General Shuldham was on guard, but the physical
difficulties of forest and mountain rendered military operations
extremely difficult; so that the second step was the occupation of
Arracan by General Richards, with the 44th, 54th, and seven Sepoy
battalions. Little else was done in that province, and the troops
suffered terribly from sickness. Soon after Rangoon was taken by Sir
A. Campbell, who had the 13th, 38th, and 41st Regiments, with a large
force of Sepoys, as well as the remains of the 44th and 54th line
Battalions, and this formed the base of all the future operations.
The war throughout was peculiar. The chief villages and towns were on
or near the banks of the Irrawaddy and its tributaries, and the whole
district was covered by dense forests and marshes through which ran
poor tracks which could scarcely be deemed roads. The enemy fought with
bravery, but rarely ventured to meet the invader in the open, basing
their defence on skilfully constructed stockades, which they rapidly
erected. The physical difficulties were great, and led to delay, which
in its turn led to a steady decimation of the white troops. Between
June 1824 and March 1825, out of an average force of about 2800 men
nearly 1400 had died. It was jungle fighting under the most severe
conditions, and the whole strategic plan of attack was the successive
assault and possession of the chief towns until the capital itself was
reached.
But little headway was made at first. The first attempts on Kemmendine
and Donabu failed; raids on Tavoy, Mergui, Tenasserim, Martaban, and
Yé succeeded. There were constant skirmishes round Rangoon, in which
the 38th and 13th especially distinguished themselves; and as Havelock
says, in his _Memoirs of the Three Campaigns_, the enemy “acquitted
themselves like men. They fell in heaps under the bayonet.”
But until 1825 began, the only result of the operations had been the
possession, more or less, of the coast line. Early in that year a
famous Burmese general, one Maha Bandoola, who had marched through
Arracan bearing with him heavy gold fetters wherewith to bind and make
captive Lord Amherst, appeared before Rangoon. The “Lord of the golden
foot” who ruled in Ava was exasperated at the capture of the place.
His first order had been: “British ships have brought foreign soldiers
to the mouth of the river. They are my prisoners. Cut me some thousand
spans of rope to bind them.” The Burmese army therefore took up and
entrenched a strong position at Kokaing, whence Rangoon was harassed;
but, attacked in rear by Cotton with the 13th Regiment (which lost 53
men and 7 officers killed and wounded, out of a total of 220) and some
Sepoys, and in front by Campbell with a force in which were the 38th,
41st, and 89th (recently arrived), the enemy, 25,000 strong, was badly
beaten by about 1500 men, and fell back on Donabu. The 47th and Royals
having arrived as reinforcements, Campbell pushed on toward Sarawak,
but Cotton, attacking Donabu, was not in sufficient force to carry out
his object; so the two wings united and attacked the place a second
time, and after desperate fighting carried the defences of the town,
and Bandoola was slain. He was a man of an inquiring disposition, and
was anxious to see the properties of the common shell, one “with a very
long fuse having been projected by the British. The live ‘creature’ was
brought fizzing at a dreadful rate to him; and he, at some distance,
surveyed with great curiosity the unfortunate men bringing the fiery
fiend along. Another second or two and it burst, killing the carriers
and every one beside it! Bandoola was thunderstruck, and for the whole
of that day his courage left him.” The stockades were “made of solid
teak beams about 17 feet high driven firmly into the earth. Behind this
wooden wall the old brick ramparts of the place rose to a considerable
height, affording a firm and elevated footing for the defenders. On
the works were 150 cannon and several guns. A ditch surrounded them,
and the passage of it was rendered difficult by spikes and great nails
planted in the earth, by treacherous holes and other contrivances.
Beyond the ditch were several rows of strong railings; but in front of
all was the most formidable defence, an abattis of felled trees, thirty
yards in breadth, extending quite round the works.”
This will give a good idea of the Burmese defences at that time.
The next post of importance occupied was Prome, still farther up the
river, and here, though the lower part of the country was now in the
undisturbed possession of the British, the Burmese army was not yet
cowed, and 60,000 men assembled to blockade Prome. But, assisted by
the fleet which accompanied the advance, the British pushed on, though
opposed step by step, in a series of skirmishes in which the 87th and
41st showed distinguished gallantry; and after a more determined battle
at Melloon, and another at Pagahan-Mew, within forty-five miles of Ava,
a treaty of peace was concluded in February 1826, whereby Arracan, Yé,
Tavoy, Mergui, and Tenasserim were added to the Indian Empire. The war
had cost the lives of 3222 Europeans and 1766 Sepoys, and placed “Ava”
on the colours of the 13th, 38th, 41st, 44th, 45th, 47th, 87th, and
89th Regiments of the line, as well as the Madras European Regiment,
afterwards the 102nd Foot.
But the treaty of Yandaboo, granting safety to merchants and opening
the country up to trade, was never really kept. So much did the
native insolence increase, that in 1852 the foreign inhabitants of
Rangoon embarked in the _Proserpine_, and the occupation of Burmah
was temporarily suspended. But the Marquis of Dalhousie, then
Governor-General, saw the danger of having a hostile State on our
borders, especially if flushed with the idea of strength. In April of
that year, therefore, an army in which were the 18th, 51st, and 80th,
under General Godwin, proceeded to Burmah, and successively occupied,
after but slight resistance, Martaban and Rangoon. In these operations
the fleet as before were usefully employed. So terrible was the heat
that many men, and Major Oakes, who commanded the artillery, perished
from sunstroke; but the key to the position, the Golden Pagoda, was
carried by the 80th and Royal Irish, after some stout fighting and
comparatively little loss. Soon after, Bassein was again taken by the
51st and garrisoned while the enemy made an ineffective attack on
Martaban; but the resistance in this war was by no means so vigorous
as in 1825; and when Pegu, which had been subdued and partly destroyed
during Alompra’s conquests, was taken by one company of the 80th and
some Madras troops, the army advanced unopposed as far as Prome, which
was taken with a loss of one man killed and one wounded. So hostilities
ceased without any formal treaty; but Pegu was annexed, and a military
road was commenced to unite Calcutta with Prome.
The final subjugation of Burmah presents few features of military
interest. The feeble rule of the king necessitated his deposition, and
the country was annexed therefore. Since then its pacification has
steadily progressed, and the military operations have mainly consisted
of moving against the bands of disbanded soldiery, or Dacoits, which
successively formed in the country.
The last operation undertaken in the peninsula was the expedition to
Perak in 1875, which, formerly ruled by Siam, had after 1822 been
independent.
Our possession of the country began in the customary way. Internal
disturbance led us to assist one side, and place a Resident, Mr. J. W.
Birch, in the country; and here again the usual results followed--his
murder, and a punitive expedition. The small war was identical with
those of the neighbouring state of Burmah, the ostensible reason for
it the inadvisability of having a disturbed, internecine war-torn
principality near our own possession of Wellesley Province, opposite
Penang. The operations, similarly, were conducted along the Perak
river; the country itself was heavily jungled and morassed; the enemy
fought us behind stockades. The jungle was “so dense and dark, that
during all the time not a vestige of sun or sky was visible overhead;
and during the advance [on Kinta] they were without cover of any kind,
and slept in the damp, dewy open.” The regiments, or portions thereof,
employed were the 10th and the 3rd Buffs, with Ghoorkas and other
native troops, aided by engineers, artillery, and naval brigades.
Of these latter there were three. Captain Butler, with some of the
men of the _Modeste_ and _Ringdove_, accompanied General Colborne on
the Perak river, which was patrolled by the boats of the navy, and
incursions from the north bank thereby prevented; Captain Garforth,
with bluejackets of the _Philomel_, _Modeste_, and _Ringdove_, was
with Ross in the Larut district; and Captain Stirling of the _Thrush_
co-operated with Colonel Hill in Sunghi Uhjong.
The physical difficulties and the food supply, the want of roads and
the climate, were the chief obstacles; but after a series of severe
skirmishes between the Perak and Kinta rivers, at Kinta, Kotah Lama
and Rathalma, the Malays accepted the inevitable, and fighting ceased.
One remarkable result may be recorded. As soon as British rule was
established, the Malays flocked in numbers to the settled land, and
“Under British sway these have increased until they numbered 120 souls
per square mile, while in the States governed by native sovereigns they
have sunk down to about seven souls in the square mile.” The districts
annexed, and righteously governed, had recently, as Sir Andrew Clarke
stated, been “huge cockpits of slaughter.” The end here unquestionably
justified the means.
* * * * *
The expedition to China was the natural outcome of our commercial
expansion, as others had been produced by colonial expansion. The
innate conservatism of China was at its highest about this time.
Freedom of trade was not; and merchandise, etc., filtered only through
the one doorway of Canton and Macao. Smuggling was rampant, especially
in opium, and this was extensively imported into the country,
notwithstanding the objections raised by the Chinese Government, which
had, twenty years earlier, prohibited its use. From mere threats they
proceeded to active measures. Some twenty thousand chests of opium were
seized, and British merchants trading in the drug were imprisoned.
Early in 1840, therefore, a combined naval and military expedition
was fitted out, the latter consisting of native Indian regiments,
together with the 18th, 26th, and 49th, and later on the 55th and
98th. The attack on the unwieldy empire was more or less coastal; its
aim exhaustion rather than occupation of large areas of territory,
the seizure of great towns rather than a connected campaign. The
Island of Chusan was chosen as the primary base of operations, and
the whole coast line, as far north as the Yangtse, was blockaded, but
the loss from disease was far greater than that caused by battle, and
the Cameronians were soon reduced from 900 to barely 300 strong. The
resistance offered was of no great value. Each success was followed by
negotiations which led to no result beyond the tedious prolongation of
the war.
Thus, in 1841, detachments of the 18th, 26th, and 49th landed and took
Chuenpee, the Bocca-Tigris Forts were destroyed, and Canton fell. The
squadron from Hong Kong Harbour then captured Amoy, the marines and
26th occupying Kulangsu on the left of the entrance, and the 18th and
49th the great battery on the right, or city, side.
The flank of this long, low, coast battery was covered by a crenelated
wall, and when the Royal Irish swarmed over it, the “Tiger Braves,” so
called from their uniform and the tiger’s face on their huge wicker
shields, endeavoured to frighten the invaders by yells and jumps. But
it had little effect, and we “picked ’em off,” said one soldier, “like
partridges on the wing.” This was the first campaign in which the
percussion musket was employed.
Chusan was abandoned for a while, but reoccupied later by the 18th,
49th, and 55th; and shortly afterwards the seaport of Ningpo was taken,
together with Chinghai; while the following year Chapoo and Woosung, at
the mouth of the Shanghai river, were destroyed, and a severe battle
took place at Chin Kiang, which placed the whole of the most important
ports of the Chinese littoral in British hands.
The Tartar troops fought with desperation at Chin Kiang, and, according
to a barbarous custom, based possibly on dread of ill-treatment to
prisoners, they murdered their wives and children before retreating.
One deep draw-well was full to the brim of drowned Tartar girls, some
well dressed and of the higher class.
The fall of Chin Kiang, and the threat to advance upon Nankin, had
brought the emperor to his senses, though probably he had been deceived
up to that time as to the result of the invaders’ efforts. He sued for
peace, therefore, and obtained it at the expense of the cession of
Hong Kong, the opening of five ports to trade, and the payment of an
indemnity of four and a quarter millions sterling. For this campaign
the regiments engaged bear the dragon, with “China,” among their badges.
There was a further small ebullition of hostility to the “Fan Kwei,” or
“foreign devils,” in 1847, in which the 18th was employed to quell the
disturbance, but it was not of much military interest.
But in 1856 hostilities again broke out on a more serious scale. The
Chinese had seized the _Arrow_, a small trading vessel, and taken a
man out of her, on the ground that he was a pirate. The insult to the
flag could not be permitted, and the refusal of apology led to a second
declaration of war. The 59th Regiment was already on the China station,
and with the assistance of the Royal Marines, early in 1857, bombarded
and stormed Canton; it also served in the expedition to the White Cloud
Mountains and at the capture of Nantow in 1858. But the gravity of
the situation in India was too profound to admit of the despatch of
reinforcements to the far East until the great Mutiny was quelled. It
was not until 1859, therefore, that active operations were resumed, and
these met with a disastrous check at the first move; for the fleet,
in attempting to destroy the forts which the Chinese had erected at
the mouth of the Peiho, was decidedly repulsed. In 1860, therefore,
a serious combined naval and military expedition was planned. The
former was commanded by Admiral Hope; the latter by Sir Hope Grant, and
consisted of the 1st Dragoon Guards, a battalion of the 1st Royals,
the 2nd Queen’s, the 3rd Buffs, and the 31st, 44th, 60th, 67th, and
99th Regiments, together with the Royal Marines and Indian troops,
including the famous “Fane’s” and “Probyn’s” Horse. But, in addition,
we were allied with a French force under General Montauban, and, as is
not uncommon in such allied operations, the small French contingent was
often rather a drag than an assistance, totally unprovided as it was
with regular cavalry.
A landing was effected near the mouth of the Peiho, at Pehtang in the
Gulf of Pecheli, and the army marched towards Sinho. The Taku forts
were of considerable size, strongly armed and surrounded by wet ditches
and lines of bamboo pickets. But they were stormed none the less, after
a brief skirmish on the way at Sinho, the works on the north side being
first assailed, as being least formidable and commanding the southern
fort, which was, moreover, to be bombarded from the sea by the French
and British gunboats. But the fall of the first north fort attacked,
where Lieutenants Rogers of the 44th and Burslem of the 67th showed
great gallantry in carrying the colours of their regiments, led to the
abandonment of the rest. Unlike the previous war, this was undertaken
with the definite strategic plan of bringing pressure to bear upon the
emperor by the seizure of his capital. Leaving the Buffs at Taku, and
despatching the 44th to Shanghai, the army marched to Tientsin, whither
the lighter vessels of the squadron also steamed. The route taken was
along the south bank of the Peiho, by Tientsin, Chan-Chia-Wan, and
Palichaio, where the river was crossed, and then, after a detour to
the Summer Palace of Yuan-ming-Yuan, the capital was reached, and
preparations made to breach its massive walls. No serious resistance
was offered until the army had reached Chan-Chia-Wan, where there was a
sharp skirmish, and the enemy abandoned his entrenched position, with
74 guns, within a few miles of Pekin; and exasperation was added to
the desire for attacking the Chinese by the unwarrantable seizure of
Captain Brabazon, Lieutenant Anderson, Mr. Norman, Mr. Bowden, and Mr.
(afterwards Sir Harry) Parkes, who were taken prisoners, and with the
sole exception of Parkes, barbarously murdered.
One last effort was made to cover Pekin, before the emperor fled,
at the Bridge of Palichaio, and here the French attacked with the
greatest vigour the Chinese Imperial Guard, and drove them back with
loss, taking 25 guns. This obtained for General Montauban the title of
Comte de Palikao. The further advance was practically unopposed. The
Summer Palace was looted and finally burned; the main gate of Pekin
surrendered to avoid bombardment.
The plunder in the Summer Palace was immense, but the French, less
scrupulous than the British, began it, and had the best of it.
“In the room,” says an eye-witness, “we proceeded to examine the
imperial curiosities, as we might have done those in a museum, but the
French officers proceeded to ‘_arracher_’ everything they took a fancy
to, gold watches and small valuables being thrust with amazing velocity
into the capacious side pockets of their voluminous red pantaloons.
Though the general asserted that nothing was to be touched till Sir
Hope Grant arrived, yet the ‘looting’ of the famous Summer Palace went
on. One French officer found a string of gorgeous pearls, each being
the size of a marble, which he afterward foolishly sold at Hong Kong
for £3000. Others had pencil-cases set with pure diamonds; others
watches and vases thickly studded with pearls.”
Again, “In an outhouse two carriages, presented to the Emperor
Taon-Kwong by Lord Macartney, were found; and such a quantity of gold
fell into the hands of the 15th Punjaubees that one officer alone got
£9000.”
The wilful destruction of the palace was a stern necessity. As Sir
Garnet Wolseley, in his account of the war, says: “The destruction
of the palace appears to have struck the Pekin authorities with awe.
It was the stamp which gave an unmistakable reality to our work of
vengeance, proving that Lord Elgin’s last letter was no idle threat,
and warning them of what they might expect in the capital itself unless
they accepted our proffered terms.”
There is one incident regarding the conduct of one of the brave men
who fought in this campaign, which is worth recording. Private Moyse
of the Buffs was, with some Indian troops, taken prisoner near Sinho,
and led before the Tartar general. Here the prisoners were ordered to
_kow-tow_, the usual salutation from the lower classes in China to the
higher classes, and which consists of kneeling down and touching the
ground several times with the forehead. The native soldiers obeyed.
Private Moyse refused, and was at once killed. The story has been
touchingly poetised by Sir F. H. Doyle, under the title of “The Private
of the Buffs.”[67]
“Last night among his fellow roughs,
He jested, quaffed, and swore,
A drunken private of the Buffs
Who never looked before.
To-day, beneath the foeman’s frown,
He stands in Elgin’s place,
Ambassador from Britain’s crown,
And type of all her race.
Poor, reckless, rude, low-born, untaught,
Bewildered, and alone;
A heart with English instinct fraught,
He yet can call his own.
Ay, tear his body limb from limb,
Bring cord or axe or flame,
He only knows that not _through_ him
Shall England come to shame.
* * * * *
Yes, honour calls, with strength like steel
He put the vision by;
Let dusky Indians whine and kneel,
An English lad must die.
And thus, with eyes that would not shrink,
With knee to man unbent,
Unfaltering on its dreadful brink
To his red grave he went.
Vain, mightiest fleets of iron framed,
Vain, those all-shattering guns,
Unless proud England keep untamed
The strong heart of her sons.
So let his name through Europe ring,
A man of mean estate,
Who died as firm as Sparta’s king
Because his soul was great.”
The battle of Palichaio practically terminated the war. The conquerors
refused to come to terms unless Pekin was itself occupied, and, when
this was agreed to, peace followed in due course. The Chinese had to
pay an indemnity of £100,000, open the port of Tientsin to trade,
and add the island of Kowloon, opposite Hong Kong, to the British
possessions in China.
* * * * *
In the area of the South Pacific there had been little employment for
the army except as the national police. No resistance had been offered
to our occupation of the islands in the Southern Seas, with the sole
exception of New Zealand. The war that broke out here was remarkable
for the great courage shown by the natives, and for the stubborn
resistance offered to the troops engaged in what were lightly called
rebellions. In such campaigns there could be no very connected plan.
It was essentially bush fighting, against isolated bodies or tribal
headquarters, very skilfully entrenched and stockaded.
It began in 1847, three years after the island had been declared
a British colony, and arose from the gradual colonisation of the
territory and the occupation of the tribal lands. This was contrary to
the national feelings of the Maoris, and was bitterly resented. The
country was much wooded, and the natives warlike and cannibal. Like
all such contests, the wars were prolonged and embittered. The first
one lasted more or less from 1849 to 1856, and from time to time kept
fully employed the 58th, 65th, 98th, and 99th Regiments of the line.
The second continued from 1860 until 1869, and employed at intervals
no less than thirteen regiments of the line, which, therefore, bear
“New Zealand” on their colours; and afforded many opportunities for
distinguished bravery, which gained Colonel M’Neill, Doctors Manley
and Temple, Lieutenant Pickard, Sergeant M’Kenna, Sergeant-major
Lucas, Ensign Down, and Drummer Stagpoole the honour of the Victoria
Cross. The regiments referred to are the 12th, 14th, 18th, 40th, 43rd,
50th, 57th, 58th, 65th, 68th, 70th, 96th, and 99th, and at one time
there were altogether some 25,000 men under arms, of which 10,000
were regulars; while, on the other hand, the enemy are said never to
have been able to muster for battle at one time more than 600 men!
The positions selected for defence were, as a rule, well chosen, and
protected with well-constructed rifle-pits, and they communicated with
each other by fire signals by night, and steam produced by pouring
water on heated stones, by day. The general plan of operation was
necessarily dislocated. As districts were cleared of the enemy, so
redoubts were made and garrisoned to hold in awe the land.
The fighting was at times terribly severe, well sustained, and at times
chivalric. At Rangiriri, where the British loss was 15 officers and 117
men killed and wounded of the 40th, 65th, 12th, and 14th Regiments, the
Maoris surrendered, and at once fraternised with their late opponents,
and in a speech said, “We fought you at Koheroa, and fought you well;
we fought you at Rangiriri, and fought you well, and now we are friends
for ever, for ever, for ever.” Similarly, at the “Gate Pah” the enemy
had entrenched himself, and threatened the station of Tauranga; so the
garrison was reinforced by the 68th and detachments of the 12th, 14th,
43rd, and 65th Regiments, with a force of marines and bluejackets,
with nine guns and six mortars, and advanced to drive the Maoris from
their strongly-entrenched position. The flanks rested on marshes,
and “on the highest point of the neck the Maoris had constructed an
oblong redoubt, well palisaded and surrounded by a strong post and rail
fence--a formidable obstacle to an advancing column, and difficult
to destroy with artillery; the interval between the side faces of
the redoubt and the swamps was defended by an entrenched line of
rifle-pits.”
This will give a fair type of the Maori method of defence, and is
sufficient evidence of a natural military eye for ground.
The attack was checked at first with heavy loss, and the enemy
escaped during the night. On the field were left 14 officers killed
and wounded, and 97 non-commissioned officers and men. For when the
stormers entered the work, the enemy had concealed themselves in
subterranean hollows or casemates, which both protected them from the
artillery fire and hid them from view, and from this cover close and
heavy volleys were fired by a concealed adversary at a range where
every shot told. The sudden panic so created spread to the supports,
and hence the disaster which fell so heavily on the gallant “fighting
43rd.”
The desultory fighting continued until the Maoris were exhausted, and
a better understanding between native customs and European methods has
led to prolonged peace.
* * * * *
Many improvements had been made in the army during the years comprising
the period under review. Rifled artillery had entirely superseded
smooth-bores after the Franco-Austrian campaign of 1859. The Enfield
rifle was converted into the breech-loading “Snider” soon after the
value of the new mechanism had been proved in the Austro-Prussian War
of 1866; but even as late as the China War many of the Indian regiments
were still armed with the old flint “firelock” or “Brown Bess.” The
Act of 1867 had been passed, making the length of army service twelve
years, with power of re-engaging for twenty-one years for pension. An
effort was made to create a reserve.
The system of payment, too, was altered in 1824, and men were paid
daily. Previous to that time a certain amount of petty cash was issued
weekly, and the balance at the end of the month.